It’s called the New New New Journalism and it’s clarified in this note from the New York Review of Books: “The article entitled ‘What Really Happened to Strauss-Kahn,’ by Edward Jay Epstein, which appeared in our December 22, 2011, issue, contained a description of what ‘looked like’ a ‘dance of celebration’ by two employees of the Hotel Sofitel in New York City at approximately 1:35 PM on the day that Dominique Strauss-Kahn was arrested in connection with an alleged sexual assault. Security camera recordings have established that the episode, as described, lasted approximately thirteen seconds, not the three minutes mentioned in the article.”

That three-minute “dance of celebration” got great play when Epstein’s article was published and it seemed to confirm that malevolent forces were at work in bringing down DSK. If 180 seconds turn into 13 seconds, what about the rest of the “facts” in the article that was so widely quoted? For background, we recommend “DSK: Left Bank and Upper West Side united in grief“.